As the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an advisory panel led by billionaire Elon Musk, moves closer to the FAA’s headquarters on Monday as it fights to slash federal workers and access government data.
Despite recent efforts to increase hiring, hundreds of probationary employees were among the FAA’s fired. The FAA’s current workforce is stretched thin, according to insiders, and there is a chronic underresourcing of the air traffic control system.
The Professional Aviation Safety Specialists (PASS) union said in a statement on Saturday that the administration’s decision to fire FAA probationary employees “represents without cause nor based on performance or conduct.”
The union pointed out that the termination notices appeared to have been sent from outside the government’s official communications systems, which are used to ensure email security and transparency when records requests are made.
“Several hundred employees have been impacted with messages being sent from an ‘ exec order ‘ Microsoft email address, not an official.gov email address”, the union explained.
On February 14, messages started arriving at 7 p.m. ET and continued through the night.
The firings occurred a few weeks after a fatal midair collision near the Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport in Washington, DC, occurred.
On January 29, that collision between a passenger jet and a Black Hawk military helicopter sparked debates about air traffic control personnel’ safety and conditions.
All passengers on both aircraft were killed: 64 civilians and three soldiers.
On the day of the crash, a controller was in charge of overseeing both commercial and helicopter flights. Trump and his allies attributed the incident to unconfirmed diversity initiatives. The collision remains under investigation.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy stated in a social media post on Sunday that DOGE staff will visit FAA headquarters to “get a firsthand look at the current system, learn what air traffic controllers like and dislike about their current tools, and envision how we can create a new, better, modern, and safer system.”
A quarter of all international flights arrive or depart from US airports, according to the FAA, which handles an average of 45, 000 flights per day.
The PASS union criticized the firings, claiming that “draconian action will increase the workload and impose new duties on a workforce that is already stretched.”
Source: Aljazeera
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